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Saturday, February 16, 2013

I know, I know. I should probably just rename this blog "Nail Art Saturday", but it's been Tuesday so long I wouldn't know what to do with that...

This week has been a bad nail week for me. It all started with a bad break when my hand slipped off a door handle while I was running errands last weekend:

I tell you what - the nerves in the tip of the finger are *not* to be messed with. Seven days later, it still hurts on and off...and naturally I'm still bashing it against random things because I'm used to having a long, protective nail there. It's even sore while typing (because normally my nails are so long I type with them, rather than my fingers). I'd highly *not* recommend this experience! Incidentally, in the "nerves are strange" category, whenever I set the nerves off in my poor pinky finger, my middle and ring fingers on that hand start aching too, from the tips to the first knuckle. Ow!

I wasn't sure how I was going to deal with the foils I wanted to try on that nail, so I'd already decided to just polish that one and use the foils on the others.

They're rather pretty, but I had a bad feeling as soon as I realized
that they were full nail stickers, rather than thin foils. I don't
typically have good luck with full nail stickers, as it takes a lot of
work to get the wrinkles out. And my fingers were already hurting. But I
tried one thumb, hoping maybe these would go on easily:

Like I said, pretty, but wrinkly. I wasn't really in the mood to mess with it, so I took that off, cleaned off the adhesive, and decided to just polish with heart rhinestones instead.

I used my favorite dark gray - OPI's "Brand New Skates" for the basic color, with Zoya's "Blair", a dark wine red (not shown) for the undersides. I placed a row of heart rhinestones down the center of each nail, but realized my Seche Vite top coat brush was stiff and basically unusable. So I used Sephora by OPI (or the other way around?) top coat, which was my second (third? fifth?) mistake of the day.

The rhinestones didn't even make it twenty-four hours before they started falling off. To add insult to injury, my top coat bubbled. *sigh* So today, my poor nails look like this:

So you see why I wasn't exactly feeling the blog post last Tuesday? I really don't have time during the week to do anything with nails, so I was pretty much stuck. At least today my pinky nail is almost grown out enough to cover the raw parts of my finger...so hopefully I'm nearly done with the whole serious pain/sensitivity part.

I'm not sure what I'll do with 'em tonight, but I'll soak the Seche Vite brush in polish remover so I can at least use a good top coat again. With any luck, I'll have something far nicer to show off next Tuesday...

Until then, happy polishing...and watch out for those slippery door handles!

Saturday, February 9, 2013

I know, I missed Tuesday. It's been a busy week! But I thought I'd post these today, because this coming week I have some pretty heart-patterned foils to try and hopefully they'll turn out to show off for Valentine's Day...

I still wasn't really "feeling" the hearts thing last week, so I decided to go a little "Joan Jett" with a black hearts manicure. The base color is Nubar's "Iris Dust" (which I adore), and the hearts were hand drawn (like you couldn't tell, right?) with a black Nubar nail art pen. I actually don't think they turned out too bad for hand drawn art...and the shaky edges kind of fit with the whole "black hearts" thing. ;-)

I used Zoya's "Suvi" underneath the nails, and that seems to have stopped the tip pull issues I've been having lately...

These photos are from today - and while there are lots of cracks and wear showing, I think it's worn pretty well considering this is day seven for this manicure.

Next Tuesday, provided it works as it should, a shiny heart foil manicure provided by OMG Nail Strips. I'll be playing with those tonight!

Tuesday, January 29, 2013

I'm not quite into Valentine's colors yet, so I figured I'd ease my way in with my favorite dark pink. I wasn't quite ready for hearts yet either, but this little heart-leaf stamp pattern caught my eye, and I quite like how it looks stamped on Essie's "Angora Cardi" with Essie's "Secret Affair".

My stamping technique still leaves a lot to be desired, and I really need to remember to wrap my tips (dang it), but I'm loving this manicure. It's calm and subtle.

Wednesday, January 23, 2013

I'm off by a day this week - probably because I had Monday off from the day job. I did another super-easy manicure this week that reflects our current weather: crackling snow. I like it...it looks a bit chaotic and cold, and that's kind of how January is, I think.

Colors Used:
Zoya "Natty"
Sally Hanson "Snow Blast" Crackle

This is the first time I've opened Natty, and I really like it. It's a medium denim-like blue that goes with pretty much everything. Very nice, and excellent smooth formula as always from Zoya. I really like Snow Blast too - Sally Hansen crackles always perform well, and this white is crisp and shiny. As a point of disclaimer, this bottle was provided to me awhile ago. The original review is around here somewhere...

This manicure really needs no explanation...just two coats of Natty over one coat of base coat, and then one sort of medium-thin coat of Sally Hanson over the top, starting at the base of the nail and brushing up in different lengths. Easy!

The tip pull this time...I'm not sure. Could be old base coat, could be I didn't get my nail beds clean enough before polishing. I didn't pull the polish up over the tips this time though, so my bad.